Talk:World Values Survey
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[edit] Reception and criticism
I don't think the "Reception and criticism" part makes any sense at all for several reasons. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.241.235.108 (talk • 69.241.235.108) 10 July 2006.
Then on 26 July 2006, contribs removed the said section, which had read:
- The Dutch intercultural researcher Geert Hofstede positively receives the WVS results. Referring specifically to Inglehart's two-dimensional reduction of his results as represented by the Inglehart Map, Hofstede claims that it supports his own work. "Inglehart's key cultural dimensions were significantly correlated with [my] dimensions. Well-being versus survival correlated strongly with individualism and masculinity; secular-rational versus traditional authority correlated negatively with power distance."[1] However, Inglehart's two dimensions are not identical to Hofstede's five dimensions. Given the differences in methodology (Hofstede's research came from work values surveys given to IBM employees) it is unsurprising that there are differences between his results and those of the World Values Survey.
- ^ Hofstede, Geert (2001). Cultures Consequences. Sage Publications. ISBN 0803973233. , pp.33-34.
The reason given in the edit summary was: Removed irrelevant comment about work by Ron Inglehart based on the WVS, comment was not about the WVS itself and thus was off-topic.
It seems to me that the above paragraph could have been better written. But to say it is off-topic is a bit harsh. It's closely related to the Inglehart Map, which the article says is one of the "most well-known results of the WVS survey". Given that someone has gone to the trouble of finding this reference and providing the information about Hofstede's partial validation of the Inglehart Map, it doesn't seem appropriate for this material to be removed from Wikipedia altogether. Could it go somewhere else, e.g. in Post-materialism? Would 69.241.235.108 like to specify what the "several reasons" for objecting were? -- JimR 03:52, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm sure I could have written it better - edits are welcome. But it was carefully researched, so it's strange to remove it completely. I don't like the way an anonymous user removed it - might be someone with an axe to grind. I'm reinserting it. If there is serious objection to it, please use the talk page and don't be anonymous. BTW, I don't personally agree with Hofstede at all; I was just trying to reflect important literary comment. Caravaca 10:04, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
I removed it because it is not about the WVS, plain and simple, it is about work derived from the WVS. There are dozens and dozens of papers that use the WVS data (I have co-authored one), should there be comments about all of them on the WVS page? It should go on a page about Inglehart's cultural map. That someone "has gone to the trouble of finding this reference" is completely irrelevant for its inclusion on this page. Finding a reference is not sufficient validation for posting something to Wikipedia. Maybe if I write a paragraph about my paper and cite it nicely it can stay here? No! There is so much that could be said about the WVS, the different variables used, the changes in wave 4, the lead investigators in each country, differences in the questions asked in each country, and other things. Since there is a section on findings, and a part there that mentions Inglehart's map work, the comment about the map should be subsumed under that section, but the map is not the survey. As the Wikipedia page correctly poins out, the first part of the first wave of the WVS did not even involve Inglehart, it was done as the European Values Survey. An axe to grind, I find that amusing. I don't know Hofstede, I don't know his work, and I've never met Inglehart although I did work at ISR when I was a PhD student. I sent him an email once about the 5th wave, but he never replied. I made it clear that the comment was not about the WVS, and it isn't, it's about Inglehart's map, which is different. The way the page was before gives such short shrift to everyone who has worked so hard collecting the data, translating the questions appropriately into so many different languages and cultural contexts, and organizing the data for analysis (I am not one of those people, nor do I know any). Yes, Inglehart is the current lead, but don't make the page about him or the work that he has done with data from the WVS. You can give him his own page, and give his map work its own page (the map is pretty cool, imho). If you want to have criticism of the WVS, that's fine. But this is criticism of work derived from the WVS, and that is a vastly different thing. Who I am is irrelevant, all that matters is my point: the comment is not about the WVS, so does not belong on the page (unless it is subsumed under the map subsection which is under the results section -- currently it is not). What is your reason for reinserting it? Just because you didn't like that I removed it? That is also not an appropriate reason to have anything in a Wikipedia entry. I can tell you that my name is Nathaniel Poor, and that I have a PhD from UM, and you can look me up online and email me to actually verify that, but none of that changes my point that the comment is not about the WVS. 20 March, 2007.
How can it be that in this map Uraguay is placed in Catholic Europe and Portugal in Latin America? How can something like that be published? Gravydog 14:02, 29 March 2007 (UTC)gravydog
GravyDog, you don't understand the map, and the map is not the WVS so shouldn't be discussed on this page. It's cultural groupings, not geographic. They then attempt to fit geography (mostly) onto culture, given the measures from the survey. See http://margaux.grandvinum.se/SebTest/wvs/articles/folder_published/article_base_54 .
